Rewarding Negative Behavior Without Knowing it? Put a Stop to it Now!
From the archive. This post was first published on the original Green Eggs and Moms blog and is kept here as it was.
Rewarding positive behavior is easy as 1-2-3. Your kid does something good, you shower her with affirmations or a prize, such as, watching a movie.
But what if positive behavior is not the only thing you reward? What if you encourage negative behavior as well?
I can sense that one of your eyebrows is raised! You doubt me. But I completely understand this skepticism. After all, it’s difficult to imagine giving praises when your daughter is on the floor screaming her lungs out.
Kids are a lot smarter than you think. Although they don’t have a degree in psychology, they know how to manipulate you.
I came across an interesting article called Parenting Expert: How NOT to take your kids’ bait. It’s centered on a problem posed by a parent to the author.
The problem:
My twin boys will be 3 years old next month. They sleep in the same room. They’ve recently taken to getting out of their beds — together, although one seems to be the ringleader — every night, over and over, for up to two hours. They make a lot of noise, then they giggle and run when I approach, and feed off each other as they’re escaping. I’m not sure what to do. All I know is that what I’ve been doing isn’t working! Help!
The solution:
According to the author, John Rosemond: Ignore them!
Why?
Would it be fun for the 2 boys to create a ruckus if mom or dad won’t come down the hall? The answer is no.
Most likely they will tire of giggling and waiting for their parents to come out and just head to their room to sleep. In short, responding to the boys’ behavior only encourages their actions.
Now can you see that it’s possible to reward behavior you don’t like? You don’t mean to but it happens, and awareness is the first step to solving any problem.
As for me, I have practiced the art of ignoring just recently- as in less than an hour ago. I was typing away with my son beside me when he slowly put his tiny arm in front of my screen.
Of course, this wasn’t enough, so he moved his fingers towards my keyboard. He knows I don’t like this behavior and usually I respond in an angry manner. However, I decided to pretend that nothing was going on. When he realized he couldn’t elicit a response, he quickly retrieved his hand.
I knew what was going on: he simply wanted attention from me.
I had been working for most of the day after all. So, after his failed attempt, I simply stopped working and started to give him the attention he wanted.
The conclusion here is simple. Know when your child is just trying to “bait” you, and don’t add fuel to the fire by reacting to it.
Happy parenting!
P.S. Look deeper into why your kid might be baiting you. In my case, I know my son does this occasionally because he wants attention. He’s already told me several times that I work all the time.
Source:Shelbystar.com – Parenting Expert: How NOT to take your kids’ bait
Photo:
Creative Commons from mdanys